In a fresh blow for travellers to and from the Top End, Virgin Australia has announced the suspension of its Darwin to Adelaide flights. From the 22nd of June, the carrier will cut all direct flights between the two cities.
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00:00Fewer options, and much longer journeys for some, as Virgin tweaks its schedule.
00:08A spokesperson explaining the move followed an internal review.
00:12As part of this review, we have made the difficult decision to indefinitely suspend our seasonal
00:17Adelaide-Darwin route based on low forecasted demand.
00:21This enables us to relocate capacity to markets where demand is higher.
00:25It's yet another slap in the face for locals.
00:28I think it's really bad because we travel a lot and most people in Darwin have family
00:33down south.
00:34The cost of flights is through the roof anyway.
00:36Yeah, I just think it's a little bit disappointing.
00:40The Chief Minister, equally disappointed.
00:42Awful, just unbelievable, and this is a big part of why we have to rebuild the economy.
00:48We need to grow our population, we need more business happening here, and these airlines
00:53need to be held accountable to what they're doing to regional Australia.
00:56But it might not be bad news for everyone.
00:58The Territory's Tourism Authority says that Virgin's promise to provide more direct flights
01:03to Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth is a welcome change.
01:07We really do hope that they are going to focus on building capacity on the other sectors,
01:13so the Brisbane and Melbourne sectors, there's definitely demand there, and it would be fantastic
01:20to see them restart the Sydney to Darwin flights.
01:24But if you're coming from, or going to, Adelaide, Jetstar and Qantas are the only airlines offering
01:30direct flights during the dry season.
01:32So for those travellers, it's back to monopoly.